The pig is an animal that has accompanied us since man changed his way of lifewhen weather conditions allowed them to stop being nomads to become sedentary and began a life system based on agriculture and livestock. Since then the pig has been the animal that has been used the most, its meat, its blood, its skin, hair, etc. We have titled this article Porcofobia, a historical hatred: The pig, an animal revered since ancient timesbecause in it we are going to take a tour of the different cultures, why it is so appreciated by some cultures and rejected by others.
Porcofobia, a Historical Hatred | The Pig in Prehistory
With the completion of last ice age, approximately in the year 8,000 BC, Earth’s climate began to changethe ice and glaciers began to recede, leaving large tracts of land which were quickly colonized by thick expanses of grass.
With the disappearance of the ice, the reindeer herds were forced to migrate to the much colder northern areas. Reindeer were one of the main sources of food for early humans, following the migrations of these herds, they had managed to survive, but now it was different, they had gone too far.
But just as the weather had taken away a very important part of their diet, it would also provide them with A new way of life, more comfortable and relaxed that would be essential for the development of the human species.
through the observation method, the first humans learned what a seed was and how, when it fell to the ground, it became a new plant. They observed which were the times in which the animals began their courtship before the females and in which times they gave birth to their young.
A lot of information that they knew how to take advantage of for their benefit, knowing how nature provided them with food, now they could be the ones to decide where and when to plant their seeds. It’s the beginning of to agriculture.
Along with agriculture, it begins to develop also the cattle ranch One of the first animals to be domesticated was the wild pig. The boars began to approach the human nuclei, a few times looking for the waste with which to feed and other times looking for protectionas most predators used to avoid contact with humans.
Slowly, the boar became an important animal For the life of the first humans, pens were created to raise them, like other animals such as goats, rabbits, etc. But the pig or wild boar had a great advantage and that was that all parts of the pig could be used, their flesh, their blood, their skin, their hair, bones, etc.
Porcofobia, a Historical Hate | The Pig in Egypt
Because the first Neolithic settlements occurred in the mesopotamian areaa, we can talk about that the pig had already been domesticated in predynastic Egypt. The Egyptian pig had rather thin legs, its snout was elongated and its back was covered by a kind of hard and spiky hair. the egyptian pig it was an intermediate species between the wild boar and the current pig.
Considered in Egypt as animal intended for meat, It is even mentioned how it was raised, however it does not appear practically represented in the chapels, nor does there seem to be any evidence of its being used in funerary banquets.
It is known that in Egypt it was a very appreciated animal since provided protein so necessary for human development. It has recently been found in the stomach of a mummy, marks of cysticercosiswhich is a parasitic disease that develops in pigs.
The pig in ancient Egypt, It was also used for therapeutic purposes, they believed that both its teeth and its fat, guts and eyes had medicinal properties. Small pig-shaped figures have also been found that could have been used as amulets.
In the Egyptian world, the mythological pig could have a meaning positiveassociated to NUT Goddess of the sky, creator of the universe and the stars. But on the other hand it was also associated with a meaning negative to Set, god of the Egyptian desert, a desert that engulfs everything that stands in its way. Set to be able to steal the moon, the left eye of the horus god, should be transformed into a black pig, reason why the keepers of the pigs could not enter inside the temple.
Porcofobia, a Historical Hatred | The Pig in Greece
In the Classic Greecethe stories of Homer in his work the Iliad, They were already recounting great celebrations with pork meat pricked on long irons and placed on the fire. The Greeks were convinced that the people who took care of the pigs had magical powersso very often the swineherd was used to get some kind of power from the gods.
in his works Homer tells us that in the city of Troy, there was a tradition consisting of the immolation of a pig, a ram and a bull, in honor of the sea god poseidon in order to calm his anger. This custom or tradition will later be adopted, also by the Romans.
We also have evidence of the festivals that took place in Sparta, In these celebrations the citizens received a broth with pork accompanied by wine and bread.
For the cretansthe pig also had a religious Connotation, It was considered a divine animal, since according to mythology a pig had fed Zeus.
in Troy it was also customary to immolate a pig as well as a bull and a ram in honor of the sea god Poseidon.
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